Nightwalker
by NeonZangetsu
Summary: In the depths of his misery and despair, a lonely little boy accidentally releases a demon back into the world. But not just any demon. The lord of night. The one to whom all evil pays homage. Now he is free...or is he? An unlikely pact between boy and vampire turns fate itself on her head, unleashing utter chaos upon the world as only a vampire can. Hellsing X-Over. NarutoxHarem
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: HAPPY HALLOWEEN EVERYONE! Each year , under a different name on a different writing website, I honour someone's request of a horror story on this most hallowed eve. And tonight...on this spooky evening, with my surgery pending, shall be no exception. Tonight, on Halloween, I proudly present you with a grisly, gritty, bone-crunching crossover not meant for the faint of heart. Tonight, I present you with...**

**...NarutoxHellsing! WARNING! This chapter, and this story, are very, very gory!**

_"Stand! The night's only just begun!"_

_~Alucard._

**Demon/Devil/Dog**

A blood moon shone down upon two figures in the clearing. One, a man garbed in red, his eyes glinting like hot coals behind the rim of his glasses, framed by ebony locks, darker than shadow itself. In contrast, the other was awash of color: from his blue eyes and blond hair right down to his black slacks and dull green flak jacket. Atop it all he wore a sleeved white robe, embroidered flames licking at its edges as though eager to devour; hungry and ready to consume what little purity the garment retained. Both had cast their hats aside long ago, leaving their faces exposed to the light; one a whiskered visage hardened through hardship, while the other retained a pallid face that bespoke of one who preferred the light of the moon to that of the sun.

Each had thrown the gauntlet down, just as they'd done with their hats. Each had taken up arms against the other in this; what was and would prove to be their final fight. This, after all they'd been through, after all the havoc they'd wrought, would be their last hurrah.

Together they had conquered entire armies of their enemies; leveled nations, crushed continents, crossed dimensions, taken whatever woman they pleased, formed entire harems and then some and now, after years of terse co-existence, their volatile partnership had finally imploded. There was no turning back. An unspeakable act had been committed between them and neither would forgive the other for what was already done. This was it. The end of everything. To the victor would go the spoils of two worlds. For the loser...there would be only death.

Speaking of death...

* * *

The blond warrior sensed a rustling in the clearing behind him.

He froze. He felt the familiar sensation of being immersed in fear. At the edge of the clearing, barely three feet away from him stood devil himself. Even though his eyesight was reduced to little more than a grim bloodsoaked blur, he could see his tall figure, immersed in the moonlight: those gleaming, crimson orbs for eyes, his inky black hair. There was a white flicker – he was grinning. Baring all those rows and rows of viscuous, jagged teeth. When the blond saw that grin, something quailed inside of him. Told him to run. To flee, to put as much distance between him and the devil as possible. His body twitched,every fiber of his being clenched, every muscle drawn taut to flee. A thorn of pride pricked him and held him back. No. He could not flee. He musn't where those he must protect. His friends, his family. His daughter. Who would protect them if not him?

"You're not going to run away?" The man in red asked_-scoffed!-_as he stared down the blond. If he was impressed he did precious little to show it.

The blonde rolled his shoulders; reluctanctly acknowledging his own refusal to stand aside.

"Would you leave the village alone, if I did?"

"Probably not." The scarlet spectre assented.

"Then I'm not moving." The blond reaffirmed. "Not this time."

There was a silence. Then, as though it were little more than a whisper:

"You always were stubborn."

They'd been friends once, the two of them. No, not friends. That wasn't the right word. Partners. Not master and servant, but something more, and yet less, all the same. But tonight, on this night, that bond had been broken. Tonight, on this most bloody of nights, nearly two decades of tension had finally come to a head; boiling over into a final conflict that would spell the end for one of them. Master and servant, comrade and ally, brothers in arms, if not blood, turned against one another over a difference of opinion twenty years in the making.

"Alucard," The blond man spoke again, his voice thick with emotion. "It doesn't have to be this way."

"It does and it will." Those eerie, white gloves of his began to pulsate, the symbols engraved there throbbing an equally eerie amber. "Our agreement is broken. There's nothing more for it."

"Stupid vampiric asshole." The blond muttered, temper slipping. He jammed both hands into his pockets, sullenly, sulking. "Anyone could see that-

The words stopped in the man's mouth, the sound replaced with blood, as the dark lord's hand abruptly thrust through his stomach.

"But _anything," _Alucard growled as he twisted the taut fingers in the man's gut, _"_is better than a life of emptiness."

With a revolting splatter, Alucard tore his hand out of the shinobi's flesh, turning away and not sparing a single second to look back at his fallen opponent.

The man was on his knees, his arms wrapped feebly around his midsection as his forehead rested pitifully on the ground. He couldn't believe he was going to die like this; bleeding to death, miles away from the village he'd sworn to protect, the dark lord of all vampires walking away coldly as his life slowly ebbed away from him. He had conquered so much during his tenure as a ninja; he'd stormed the gates of Otogakure, killed both Kabuto and Orochimaru to take back his beloved, fought in the fourth shinobi wars, and become the Rokudaime Hokage. He was a married man, a happily married man with many wives, a daughter, a son, and several more on the way.

Now he was going to sit here and bleed to death in the moonlight. Somewhere, he could hear his wife laughing.

_Are you really going to die like this, shithead?_

The man chuckled.

_Was_ he really going to die like this?

**_Hell...no!_**

Alucard stopped in his tracks, his face slowly appearing over his shoulder as he curiously regarded his once fallen opponent. A look of irritation crossed his single eye as it regarded the recovering shinobi behind him. He could still stand after that? He hadn't given the boy enough credit.

"I see," he said, leaving his back turned as he reached for the weapons beneath his jacket. "So you still think that you can—"

Crimson eyes went wide as his right arm was severed from his body, the limb now falling away from him in a flash. The gloved fingers were wriggling slightly as the nerve endings within them struggled to receive signal from his brain once more, dropping the sword that they once held as his hand groped on blindly. The red man lunged forward, his left arm stretched out in an attempt to grab and wield the fallen weapon.

The blond man buzzed into view, his body blocking the vampire's limb, his eyes glaring out coldly from behind the frightening grin of his shroud. With a hiss, he swung his hand backwards, a _rasenshuriken _rocketing out from the tip of his finger and incinerating both the vampire's arm and pistol within the blazing energy.

"Impressive." Alucard smiled, his lips twisting from amusement into a rictus of barely contained fury, joining the blood pooling beneath his feet. "Impressive!" He chortled softly. "I actually missed that one."

"There's no way in hell I'm letting you use those guns, _sensei."_ The blond growled, all but spitting the words in recompense for his earlier temerity. He held up a hand, revealing: a familiar, tri-pronged kunai dangling from a finger. He grinned at the latter's befuddled expression. "Thought I was sulking, did you?" His grin grew still further as he flung the deadly _Hiraishin_ kunai from his finger and into his fist. "Such is the way of the shinobi; look underneath the underneath." Even as Alucard saw it the hole in the man's stomach began to close. "Do you remember these?" he asked aloud, wondering. "My father's kunai?" The man gave each dagger an experimental twirl. "I've improved by leaps and bounds since I've used them last. Allow me to show you!"

He flitted forward, vanishing in a swirl of leaves, leaving Alucard alone.

The crimson demon arched an eyebrow, gazing at the mangled nub of his with thinly veiled amusement. That arrogant, scornful smile, betraying nothing but mirthful, maddening glee. A whisper of shadow trailed forth from the wound and within seconds, his arm was restored. A second pistol slithered forth from the shadows and snugly into his grip, replacing the one that had been lost. Then _he_ was gone; vanished in an unholy swirl of scarlet to the man's saffron. Gold and crimson collided and came apart and collided _again _tearing into flesh and cloth and bone and marrow with each passing, their wounds healing only to torn assunder again.

Had any mortal borne witnessed to the clash between these two titans, they surely would've gouged their eyes out, such was the blood that stained the clearing. The trees were coated by it, the grass slick with it, more than once did one of them lose traction and nearly lose their life in the same instance. When the blond shinobi lost his footing more than thrice the lord of the night was particularly...unforgiving. The muzzle of his pistol crackled outward like a whip, smashing into the man's face with all the force of a sledgehammer; leaving him staggered and stunned. Black spots speckling at his vision, the man flung a kunai; even as a bullet punched through his stomach and drove him to the ground the deadly dagger flew straight and true; embedding itself to the hilt in the dark lord's in the shoulder.

"Now now," Alucard frowned, _"that wasn't very nice."_ He swung around, his remaining gun firing; once, twice, three times in rapid succession. Each bullet tore through the air The blond man toppled to the ground with a gasp, bereft of both legs, sundered at the knees. Crimson vitae spurted between broken bone and cartilege, leaving his fingers grasping furtively at the wounds, as though they could somehow stem the tide of blood leaving them. The man in red, laughed; his tone modulating to a darkened glee. He brought the twin guns forward, discarding all attempts at defense as he opened his arms to the blond.

"Oooh," He chuckled darkly. "That looked painful."

_"Aaargh!"_ The blond man yowled in agony, old familiarity and years of exasperation seeping their way into his expression; worming their way into his words as he clutched at the bloodied stump of his legs. "Alucard you sonuva bitch! That's no fair, using guns!"

The lord of all vampires merely scoffed.

"I already told you, didn't I?" he said, wagging a pistol before the blonde's face. "Our agreement is now null and void. I'm free to use whatever means I wish, so long as I kill you."

"Didn't you say it was a _human_ that should kill you?"

Alucard's only response was to hold one of the man's severed feet, hoisting it up by the ankle. Then he bit down. _Hard._ Bone crunched against teeth and gave way; yielding to those ghastly pearly white fangs, gnashing and grinding and crunching together greedily, devouring the limb as though it were a mere morsel, sandal and all.

"Why do you hesitate? You've only had your leg severed so far. Now shed your last vestiges of doubt and stand." He grinned, beckoning with the silver pistol. "Stand! Shake off your wounds! Regenerate your limbs! Call forth your familiars! Transform your body! Hurry!" His voice rose in crescendo, his words a palpable bloodlust for all the forest to feel; for the village beyond its borders to fear. "The night's only just begun!" The devilish man cackled anew, a rising symphony of complete and utter madness. "Hurry! Hurry! Hurry! The fun's about to start!" His voice dropped a note, lips twisting into a cruel sneer. "Or, _do _you wish to stay that way and diie before me once again...Uzumaki Naruto?!"

The newly named man growled, baring his fangs in blatant defiance. He was already taxed beyond measure; even with his own ungodly power he held no possible hope of defeating this demon as he stood now. This man...this soulless creature standing before him...he made _Kurama_ look like a harmless hairball! Nonetheless, he was not the sort to let an insult like that stand, not for long. Closing hiis eyes with an effort, the boy who'd become a man who'd become Rokudaime Hokage six years before, bid himself be calm.

_Concentrate,_ he willed at his broken body. _Concentrate!_ Slowly, ever so slowly, crimson-gold energies birthed from the pit of his stomach; burgeoning his battered body, seeping from his every pore like sweat, flowing across the savaged stumps as though blood through an open wound. In mere moments his body was whole. Complete and whole and untattered, as though it'd never been battered and bloodied and bruised. His white kage robe slipped from his shoulders, fluttering into the breeze as he pulled himself to his feet.

"See?" Alucard prodded. "You can do it if you try."

Naruto snorted.

He stood woodenly, on his new limbs, not taking enough care. Fingerless gloves brushing the ground, knuckles scraping the earth, he swayed back and forth; to and fro like a man who'd had too much to drink. Alucard chuckled; because the fun was finally about to start. After nearly two decades, an endless eternity of poking and proding, he'd finally have the fight he desired with Uzumaki Naruto. The one being in this realm who was human, yet not human, possibly the only one capable of ever laying his thrice-damned soul to rest.

"Alucard...you've gone and done it now." He placed his hands together, azure eyes sliding shut. When he opened them again they were more akin to endless oceans of blood than the bright afternoon skies for which he was so very well known. "You know I can't hold back when I'm like this." He stepped forward, and the dark king strode forth to meet him. Crimson met scarlet, two beings of ungodly power staring one another down as they closed the gauntlet between them.

"Oho, aren't we clever?" Alucard couldn't help but chortle as the distance narrowed; it was a deep, throaty sound. "You may bark like a dog-

His pistol cracked outward, smashing against the blonde's skull as he phased into existence at his rear. He blinked in surprise as the weapon flopped away from him, alongside the entirety of his left arm. The Naruto he had struck abruptly dissipated; turning to whisps of smoke as he looked on. Ah. Another one of his clones, then. He swiveled, searching for the original in the darkness that enveloped them. _There!_ A flicker of light, and a second kunai slammed into his back. Her ripped the deadly dagger from his back, uncaring as the wound wept crimson.

-but at least you possess _some_ bite."

**"Funny you should mention that."** A darkened voice rose from behind him, teeth glistening in the gloom.

Even as he contemplated it, row upon row of serrated teeth sank into his shoulder; the kage's fangs plunging into the very same place where the inferal kunai had struck him, rather, just above it. _That kunai!_ Alucard's ever-present smile slipped into a frown. He risked a glance down at himself. Sure enough, there it was. The mark. Those blasted kunai where the reason for his speed; they allowed him to teleport, to whatever location he pleased so long as it was makred. Pain tore through his right shoulder jarring the vampire from his reverie just in time; because the blond jerked his head from side-to-side, the sawlike motion, tearing a great chunk of flesh from the elder vampire's body. In the same instant he brought both kunai down in a crossing motion. Severed were Alucard's arms, the limbs flopping uselessly to the ground alongside his legs.

Alucard hissed as he toppled to the bloodsoaked blades of grass; his first true expression of pain since their battle had begun. His wounds throbbed unbearably. More blood seeped, staining his already scarlet jacket, an impossible, unbearable shade of crimson. Slowly _ever so slowly,_ all his wounds trickled away; a renewed smile slithering its way across his features alongside his newfound arms and legs. Suddenly, and without warning Alucard lunged upward, alarming the blond standing over him.

"Yes!" he cackled as he rose, swooping at the blond like a vengeful spectre. "This is it! This is what I've been waiting for!" He struck like lightning, both legs scissoring upward, locking around the blonde's baffled body in a gross macabre of an embrace, trapping both arms ineffecutally at his side. Fingers sank deep into thick shoulders, piercing flesh, pinning bone, securing his prey in place. Eyes agleam with maddened mirth, and fangs bared, Alucard lingered just a moment longer; savoring the delightfully horrified expression his former ally wore, those crimson eyes bulging so large he was certain they'd fall out of the kage's head. Having savored the moment long enoughhe struck, sinking those deadly incisors deep into the man's neck to drain him dry. Rather, he would have...

...had not the forged metal of the blonde's _hitiate_ greeted his jaw. Uncompromising steel barreled upward as the blond took the only option of recourse left him; headbutting the dark lord with enough force to leave his own teeth badly rattled; forcing Alucard's mouth to snap shut over his forked tongue like a guillotine.

_"Aaaaaargh!"_

The lord of all vampires roared his surprise, the remnants of his fleshy appendage flopping uselessly in his mouth. In his dismay he inadvertantly released the blond, his hold slackening in surprise as the blond tore both his body and his legs free from the dread king's grip. But not his shoulders. Despite the pain, despite the searing, all encompassing agony inside his mouth, Alucard did not completely relent; he refused to release those bonecrushing fingers from the blonde's collarbone. His abrupt extrication came at a cost; both arms were left flopping in Alucard's grip as he dragged himself back from the brink.

Naruto sank to his knees with a groan, crimson spurting from the mangled stumps of bone. His wounds were healing but regeneration did precious little to dull the pain. Nevertheless he screamed in defiance as Alucard loomed over him, blood leaking his mouth as he struggled to restore his powers of speech. Naruto silently willed his arms to hasten their growth, muscle crawling over bone, epidermis slowly stitching itself back togethr in the wake of the loss of his limbs.

"Very amusing." When the dracula at last recovered his voice, it was little more than a ragged gasp. "You nearly made me swallow my tongue there, you stupid brat."

In his right hand was one of Naruto's tan arms, the stump where it had been severed squirting out blood in small jets. The elder vampire looked at it for a moment before chucking it away thoughtlessly. His entire being suddenly shimmered, not with light, but darkness itself.

"Uzumaki Naruto." Alucard purred, raising his hands, placing both palms together. "I congratulate you. Never once did I expect you to push me this far in battle before. I hereby recognize you as more than a dog. More than a human. I recognize you as a true successor of mine...**and as a reward, I shall kill you swiftly!"**

Once, as a youth, he would've killed to hear those words. Now, they evoked only a nameless surge of dread.

Naruto balked as the elder vampire that was Alucard began to shimmer; his very being rippling as though a massive stone had splashed through the ocean of darkness that was his being. No! He wasn't ready yet! Both arms were a long way from being restored; he could not boast the limitless regeneration of the lord of night. He needed more time! But time was in precious short supply; and he could not afford it; nor did the dreaded Alucard afford him the chance as he clamored to his feet. The Rokudaime Hokage could only gasp out a single word as the elder vampire radiated palpable killing intent:

_"Shit."_

"Releasing control restriction system." He intoned, his voice deep and silken. "Level three, level two, level one." As one, the seal upon each of his gloves began to writhe, glowing brighter than ever before. "Recognizing approval of Situation A according to the Cromwell invocation." Lifting his hands, he formed a square with both fingers. Dozens of eerie, crimson eyes blossomed along the length of his body, wide-eyed and staring down at him, this, his most worthy of adversaries. "Commencing limited lifting of ability use restrictions until the enemy before me has been rendered completely silent."

Naruto, having felt the last stitch of flesh flow back into place over his mangled hands in the midst of the vampire's release, surged forward, intent on ending things before it was too late. Before this...whatever his once maddened mentor became once more. He never made it more than three steps.

Naruto stopped his advance as Alucard's _prescence _began to swallow up the clearing, nay, the entire forest beyond the village's one good eye widened in shock as this eerie power began to materialize and envelop the vampire across from him, completely covering Alucard in an entirely black chrysalis. As another wave of energy shot outwards at him, the dense sensation of _dread, _tore away, revealing a hellish and black demon, the vampire that was Alucard, freed from all but one of his restraints. Hounds erupted from his very flesh, roiling in darkness, barking and baying for his blood. _Naruto's blood._ The kage in question gulped.

"Ah, bloody hell...

Alucard cackled.

"Well then, boy, time to educate you as to_**...how a real vampire fights!"**_

"Is that so?" Naruto shoved his fear into the deepest, darkest corners of his mind and forced himself to stand tall before the full might of his former teacher. "In that case, I've..._got a lesson to teach you!"_ Chakra flared around his body, sheathing him in hellishly bright light that was neither his nor his own. Crimson eyes glinted and became slitted as his lids dusted with orange, joining to create cross-shaped pupils; the sudden change in his eyes, evoking an eerie transfiguration all his own. In a shroud of golden light and crimson shadow, he transformed; his skin glinting with golden light of the cloak and marks of his ancestor, the Rikudo-Senin. Was he human, that was where it would've ended. But he was no longer human.

Flames licked across his body, pooling at his feet. Assuming shape and form. Another. And another. Another still, their number ever rising...

**"Summoning your familiars already?"** Alucard scoffed as the kage's shadows took shape at his back, forming his own tumultuous horde behind him. **"Aren't you the eager one?" **Numbering nearly five thousand strong, the faceless army stood behind the Rokudaime's back, awaiting his orders. They were a nameless army of lost souls, of villians and heroes past and present, devoid of any will now save that of their master. He raised a hand for silence, and their ghastly wails quieted

Naruto grinned, exposing pearly white canines.

_"I know I don't stand a chance against you unless I go all out from the beginning."_

**"That's the way you are!"** Alucard laughed, darkness roiling about his frame.** "And that's the way I am! Very well! To the victor goes the spoils of this world! To the loser...**

_...death_/**death!"**

Two opposing sides collided; one, wielding a thrice cursed army for the sake of those he loved. The other, a lone devil, intent on destruction.

How had it come to this? How had the world been turned on its ass so effortlessly? Did the laws of reality no longer apply? Where the morals of good and evil no longer existent, no longer accountable in this clash with the fate of the world and its future at stake? How had it happened? How had it come about?

It began so long ago...

_...many, many years ago..._

**A/N: Flashback next chapter! Just how did Naruto become a vampire capable of giving Alucard a run for his money? Well...you'll soon find out! Pairing is NarutoxHarem. Badass Naruto is badass! How did they meet? Did Alucard make him a vampire, I wonder? And just what was their conflict that caused them to part ways so violently? I've already dropped a hint that one of the girls shall be from Oto, but that's enough of a hint for the time being, wouldn't you agree? In the next chapter, we see just how Naruto became who he is now; a badass mother f*****r capable of standing on par with Alucard in his unreleased state and then some. Now, in the immortal words of Atlas...**

**...review, would you kindly?**

**R&R! =D**


	2. Chorus

**A/N: Well now, I'm glad to see that the last chapter satisfied! We travel now to Naruto's past, to find out just how his unlikely alliance with Alucard first came to be. Suffice it to say it'll be...unexpected. The next chapter will be longer, I promise, you! And, just so we have clarification, this takes place directly after Naruto's become a genin. He's done a few D-Ranked missions, but hasn't gone to Wave..yet. So now...**

**...onto the next chapter of Nightwalker!**

_"Vat? Vhy do you stare at me so? Und vhy are you smiling?"_

_~Rip van Winkle._

**Chorus**

It was a night unlike any other, years before everything fell apart.

On this, his fourteenth birthday, a strange voice had lulled him from the darkness in the middle of the night, lured him from his bed and into the forest. T'was curiousity that roused the newly-minted genin from his bed, curiousity that caused him to leave his apartment stride through the eerie empty streets and slip through the gate without being detected. The voice sang out at him all the while; a siren's cry speaking to him in ancient tongue; a language he hadn no hope of understanding yet understood all the same.

_"Mein Sohn, nur Mut!" _A woman's voice lilted out at him from within the darkness, her words foreign; strange and alien. _"Wer Gott vertraunt, baut gut! Jetzt auf! In Bergen und Kliiften, Tobt morgen der freudige Krieg! Das Wild in Fluren und Triften, Der Aar in Wolken und Luften Ist unser, und unser der Sieg! Und unser der Sieg! Und unser der Sieg!_

Naruto didn't know how far he walked, or for how long, only that the chrous beckoned him ever onward. He wasn't quite aware of the change, or when it even took place, only that it did. When he finally thought to risk a glance for his surroundings, he found his breath taken away. Somehwere during his moonlight stroll the trees had died; the once vibrant oaks for which Konoh was so well know were now nowhere to be seen. And all the soil...it was rotten. Every step broke some of it away beneath his sandals...as if the darkness itself were squirming beneath his feet. The moon was even worse. It hung over him now, a crimson-red orb staining the dark tapestry of the sky.

**"Keep walking, boy."** A darkened voice hissed at him from the blackness of his mind.** "Let me see if you are worthy." **Naruto nearly recoiled. He wasn't sure if was his own demon or something else...

Naruto shuddered.

He took a sharp intake of breath. Huh? What on earth-_where_ on earth _was_ he? Anxiety began to gnaw within him. How _did_ he end up here? He couldn't recall anything that could have lead him to this situation. Nothing, save the voice, beckoning him onward. He shook his head, seeing no recourse but to advance. He'd come this far, after all...

There! Light!

He stepped into the clearing, only mildly relieved to find that the moon was

The form began to take shape in the moonlight as he approached- tall, slim, and lanky. As the darkness began to slowly seep away, it exposed the moonlit dancer. Her figure was slender, clad in an all black uniform. If it weren't for the slight swell in the hips and curve of the breast, she would have looked decidedly male. She bore a freckled, youthful face, long arms and legs, and equally long hair, a cascade of raven locks- accented with a few stray hairs and a stretched curlicue in the front. And she was singing. She was songstress that had lured him from his bed in the middle of the night and now threatened to lop of his head with a single sweep of her slim arm.

Cobalt blue eyes drifted open.

"Und it vould seem I have an audience." she whispered, her taut fingers stretching across the rifle she held. Naruto froze, rooted in place by her words. In an instant she was upon him, pinnioning him with her gaze. He couldn't move. Couldn't breathe; as those dark lashes fluttered open and shut. She loomed over him like death; pearly whites glintng in a slight smile; sending silent shivers shooting down his spine. She pushed up the rim of her spectacles with one hand, held the rifle in the other, her gaze cutting through him like a knife.

"You heard?" She asked, peering at him intently over the rim of her glasses. Naruto gulped, choking back the instinctive urge to lie, to falsify the truth. He had the succint feeling dishonesty would not be tolerated here; not by this woman's and her eerie blue eyes.

"H-Hai," he stammered.

"Vell zhen," She had a succint accent to her words, her w's replaced with a succint v. "Vhat did you zhink?"

"I...erm...um...

He swallowed.

...I liked it."

_"Oh?"_

The woman had said nothing the entire time; it was if her very existence dangled upon the precipiece, depending upon his very words. Now, she made a move toward him, yet. Her entire demeanor seemed to soften in the span of those steps; shifting from mild scorn to surprise to gentle amusement. Someting in Naruto quailed at the sight of her, this graceful predator slinking towards him, but he found himself rooted by her gaze. A low growl left his lips.

"Zere is no need to fear me, boy." The woman teased. "If I vanted to devour you, I vould have done it vithout luring you here. Now, be a dear and hold stil."

"Wiat, what're you...

She touched a gloved hand to his face, her fingers lingering there, for the span of two beats. Then she struck. _Not gently._ Naruto winced, as gloved fingers bit into his cheek, creating a small slice on the side of his face, tearing a small rent, inside his skin. It wasn't a deep wound, by any means, but it did bleed. The woman's hand came away, wet with his blood. A long tongue flitted between her lips to lap up the blood soiling the white pristine surface of her gloves. Naruto recoiled in shock as she smiled at him, bearing bloody fangs in a toothy grin. W-Were those fangs?!

"You have excellent blood, boy." She leaned down until her face was even with his own, cupping his cheeks within her palms. "Let me have another taste before I decide vhat to do vith you...

"W-What the hell're you doing?!" he exclaimed aghast as she licked at his wounds, her tongue flitting through slice in his whiskered cheeks. "Stop licking me!" He demanded! "That's gross! Disgusting!" He swung at her haphazardly but to no avail; she danced backwards with a giggle, leaving his fist to sweep harmlessly through empty air. _Fast! And...weird!_ He thought, as she raised a bloodied finger to her lips and promptly began to suckle it.

"Mmm." The woman purred, sucking on the bloodsoaked finger. "This _is_ delicous. And yet...

Abruptly, her cobalt blue eyes bulged.

"Oh gott," she breathed in accented surprise. "Your blood...it...it tastes just like his. Zis...Zis cannot be!"

"M-My blood?"

The woman surprised him once more then; she tucked the rifle into her chest and bowed, low and deep at the waist, her head thrust for the floor. When she raised her gaze any and all trace of scorn were subsuquently eradicated. Whatever spell she'd held over him was broken. Her expression was eager, almost earnest.

"My deepest apologies, young master!" She bowed her head once more. "I did not know it vas you!"

_"Ha?"_

"My name is Rip van Winkle." The woman continued, heedless of his confusion. "I...ja..._ve_..." and here she did shake her head, "have avaited your return for such a long time. Ve had begun to think zat you vould not ever return...but you have!" Her expression was one of complete and utter bliss. "After all zhese years...

Naruto blinked his surprise. We? He saw no one else here beside the woman_-Rip, he reminded himself-_and his self. That thought was dashed as she took his hand in her own, guiding him out of the clearing and deeper into the forest. Naruto balked at the prospect at entering this portion of the woods; with its dead, dry trees and its broken, parched soil. It felt as though he were stepping into the very heart of evil. He tried to dig both his feet in, but to no avai; there was nothing he could do to break the woman's supernatural grip.

"Oi!" He yelped. "Where are you taking me?!"

Rip continued to lead him on, ignoring his complaints.

"Please refrain from dragging your feet vhile I lead you to ze estate, young master." She continued in her lilting, accented voice. "It is not befitting of one of ze Hellsing bloodline."

"Hellsing?" The boy blinked rapidly. "Estate?"

Naruto was seriously confused!

**A/N: This would make Naruto, and by definiton the namikaze clan, the great-great-great-great-GREAT-descendants of the hellsing family. Why else would Alucard be willing to tolerate him, let alone serve him? I tweaked a few things around but lets clarify. Hellsing won over Millenium, and Schrodinger was never absorbed. Centuries have passed since then; the hellsing bloodline is nearly extinguished. Rip van Winkle is one of the few remaining familiars of Alucard, guarding his and Seras's tomb for the span of her long lfe. After all, vampires need to sleep, do ze not? Gah, confounded german accent...creeping up on me again!**

**Translation to Rip's german song:**

**Just be courageous my son! You do well to trust in God. Now! Tomorrow joyful war will be raging in mountains and valleys. Wild game in meadows and trailings The eagle in clouds and air Victory is ours and ours!**

**Jigoku no Banken: Hounds of Hell.**

**Now that I've provided the translations and such, feel free to review. So, in the immortal words of Sir Integra...**

**...SEARCH AND DES-...erm, would you kindly review?**

**R&R! =D**


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